Hidden in plain sight–that’s how researchers describe their discovery of a new genus of large forest tree commonly found, yet previously scientifically unknown, in the […]

The post Remarkable new tree species was “hidden in plain sight” in the Andes appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

According to a new study by biologists at the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center and Virginia Tech the offspring of a certain songbird, the wood thrush, […]

The post Study: Large shady forest plots essential to survival of post-fledgling songbirds during drought appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Camouflage is a valuable survival strategy—just ask a chameleon. Scientists have just discovered a new form of mimicry camouflage: beetles that hide by chewing beetle-shaped […]

The post For millions of years these tiny beetles have chewed their way out of sight appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

The methods for X-ray crystal orientation are rapidly evolving towards versatility, fewer goniometry measurements, automation, high accuracy and precision. One method that attracts a lot of attention is energy-dispersive X-ray diffraction (EDXRD) which is based on detecting reflections from crystallographic planes in a crystal at fixed angles of a parallel polychromatic X-ray incident beam. In theory, an EDXRD peak can move in a diffraction pattern as a function of a crystallographic plane d-spacing and its orientation relative to a fixed direction in space can change also. This is equivalent to the possibility of measuring the orientation of single crystals. The article provides a modeling for the EDXRD method whose main feature is the nonmoving crystal in the sense of traditional goniometry where the angle measurements of diffracting planes are a must. The article defines the equation of orientation for the method and shows the derivation in great detail. It is shown that the exact solutions of the equations can be obtained using the generalized reduced gradient method, a mathematical subroutine that is implemented in Excel software. The significance and scientific impact of the work are discussed along with the validated tested results.

When creating a System Composer architecture model, if the following functions are called with an invalid or missing stereotype, it can cause the model to get corrupted and might lead to a MATLAB crash:

• addComponent
• addPort
• connect

Simulink might produce an incorrect sorted order for a model that meets all of the following conditions:

• The model contains blocks from the SoC Blockset
• The Signal logging option is selected in the model configuration set
• Signals using asynchronous sample time are configured for logging

The Open Banking Report 2019 clarifies the role of key key-players in a post-September 14th world and assesses how the landscape has shifted within Europe and beyond.

The backdrop of the stage with the Oscar Award is seen onstage during the 84th Academy Awards announcement held at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Samuel Goldwyn Theater on Jan. 24, 2012 in Los Angeles.; Credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images

The Academy Awards have made history with breakthroughs for minorities in the past — but with this year's nominations, observers are noting how white the Oscars are, with no actors of color nominated in any of this year's acting categories.

It marks the least diverse nominations since 1998. People have been speaking out about this disconnect, with films like "Selma" being shut out of the acting nominations (though it did pick up a Best Picture nomination).

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Features of azimuthal plots for RHEED and its new counterpart, RHEPD, are discussed. The plots, for both electrons and positrons, are determined using dynamical diffraction theory.

(The Paypers) CredoLab has partnered with iovation to integrate

(The Paypers) Consumer expectations for convenience have increased significantly across a variety of markets, and quick-service restaurants (QSRs) are no...

(The Paypers) AML data and tech company Vital4 has revealed its partnership with UK-based

(The Paypers) Financial institutions (FIs) working in digital assets have been required by US regulatory bodies to pay attention to their anti-money laundering and...

(The Paypers)

Child care provider Antonia Rivas leads children in yoga at her Reseda home on Feb. 13. Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon is introducing a bill to fund child care and provider training, and set up a structure to facilitate collective bargaining for family child care workers.; Credit: File Photo: Maya Sugarman/KPCC

Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon is introducing a new bill on Wednesday that aims to address the state's critical child care shortage and give providers the right to unionize.

The lack of sufficient child care has been statewide. In Los Angeles County, a recent study found only 2 percent of infants and toddlers have access to a licensed child care facility; for preschoolers, it's about 40 percent.

The shortage is most acute in low-income areas, and the bill aims to inject more child care vouchers into the system so poor families can have free child care.

A more controversial provision, however, would allow collective bargaining for those who provide child care in their homes whose earnings can fall near or below the minimum wage. Child advocates cite poor pay as a major reason why providers often leave the field.

“The turnover in the child care field is approaching 30 percent. So the lack of continuity and quality care is a major obstacle,” said El Cerrito Mayor Mark Friedman.

Friedman co-chairs a coalition of early childhood groups called Raising California Together. Preschool advocacy groups, anti-poverty and immigrant groups, NAACP, and the Santa Monica school district count among its members.

“I think one thing everybody agrees on as a high priority is getting more resources in the system, and if there is a strong union presence in the field that then there will be a stronger voice for those additional resources,” said Friedman. 

Under the bill,  a network of 32,000 home childcare providers statewide could unionize. Currently, providers operate as independent business owners and typically lack the right to organize and collectively bargain for wages.

Finding child care

For many families, having a quality child care option is their most pressing need.

Vicky Montoya, a Reseda mother of three, is desperate for a child care alternative to family members. Montoya’s 18-month-old son, Esteban, is a bright-eyed toddler who loves balls. He can fling one clear across a room, even a field. But all too often, when both his parents are at work, he’s not doing much.

“Sometimes he’s with an aunt, sometimes with my eldest daughter,” Montoya said in Spanish. “But he doesn’t really do anything, all he does is watch cartoons on TV. And he’s alone, there’s no other children around.”

Montoya works five hours a day at a solar company, where she makes $10 an hour. Her family depends on her income to supplement her husband’s low-wage, full-time job. Montoya applied for a child care voucher so Esteban could go to a properly licensed day care. She submitted two applications to a local agency over the last two months.

When she called the agency to find out the status of her applications, she said she wasn't given much information. “'You are on the waiting list,'” she said they told her, “'and there are people ahead of you.'”

Seeking unions as a solution

In Maryland, unionized providers reduced the wait list for poor families by 80 percent by securing state dollars to fund more free child care slots. According to a 2010 report by the National Women's Law Center, 14 states guarantee home-based child care workers the right to unionize.

SEIU Local 99 spokesperson Terry Carter said what local providers tell her is that they want a seat at the table where child care decisions are made.

“What collective bargaining would do for providers is it would let them sit down with the top decision makers in the state and say these are things that are simple to fix, they would vastly improve our ability to operate our businesses and they would give us the time to direct more of our attention and energies into raising California’s kids,” Carter said.  

Some of those issues include delayed government payments for subsidized child child and the low reimbursement rate from the state for serving low-income kids.

Antonia Rivas, a Reseda child care provider, knows well the struggle of providing care in her home. She infuses yoga and meditation into daily lessons, and buys organic food, her major expense.

But she also has to pay her assistants, buy toys, books, and supplies. After her costs, she said there is not much left.

“I just got my 2014 W-2 and it's $24,000,” Rivas said. Her W-2 comes from the agency that pays her for the low-income kids she serves. Add to that the $15,000 from her private paying families and Rivas pulled in about $40,000 last year. After expenses, she estimates she netted less than the minimum wage for her time.

Rivas said with her low wages and delays in receiving payments from government agencies for subsidized child care, she is constantly relying on credit to keep her business running.

“We need to get a contract [and] better pay,” Rivas said.

Even if the child care legislation passes, a contract with the state would be a long way down the road. All child care providers would need to vote on whether they want union representation. And, if all that is successful, child care providers could then negotiate a labor contract.

Similar bills granting child care providers the right to unionize have made it out of the legislature, but both Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Gov. Jerry Brown have vetoed them.

Opponents have called the effort to organize providers a move to empower labor unions, not fix a broken child care system. 

Recent legal rulings are also presenting challenges to unions seeking to organize both child care workers and health care workers. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year in an Illinois case that home health workers could opt out of paying union dues, even though they are paid with state subsidies.

While Vicky Montoya waits for a better solution for her son's care, she pays Esteban’s aunt or a neighbor $10 a day to watch him while she works.

“I know lots of families who have to leave their children with a babysitter, usually just a woman who watches the child. But they are not trained and even their homes are not suitable for childcare,” she said. 

Correction: A previous version of this story erroneously described a U.S. Supreme Court case as originating in Minnesota. 

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Yaya Wang
Apr 7, 2020; 133:jcs228072-jcs228072
REVIEW

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Apr 15, 2020; 0:jcs.245043v1-jcs.245043
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Earth's magnetic field seems steady and true -- reliable enough to navigate by. Yet, largely hidden from daily life, the field drifts, waxes and wanes. The magnetic North Pole is currently shifting toward Siberia, forcing the Global Positioning System that underlies modern navigation to update its software sooner than expected. Every several hundred thousand years, the magnetic field dramatically shifts and reverses its polarity. Magnetic north flips to the geographic South Pole and, eventually, back again. This reversal has happened countless times over Earth's history, but scientists' understanding of why and how the field reverses is limited. The researchers find that the most recent field reversal 770,000 years ago took at least 22,000 years to complete, several times longer than previously thought. The results call into question controversial findings that some reversals could occur within a human lifetime.

Image credit: Brad Singer

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The Maya of Central America are thought to have been a kinder, gentler civilization, especially compared to the Aztecs of Mexico. At the peak of Mayan culture some 1,500 years ago, warfare seemed ritualistic, designed to extort ransom for captive royalty or to subjugate rival dynasties, with limited impact on the surrounding population. Only later, archeologists thought, did increasing drought and climate change lead to total warfare -- cities and dynasties were wiped off the map in so-called termination events -- and the collapse of the lowland Maya civilization around 1,000 A.D. (or C.E., current era). New evidence unearthed by National Science Foundation-funded researchers call all this into question, suggesting that the Maya engaged in scorched-earth military campaigns -- a strategy that aims to destroy anything of use, including cropland -- even at the height of their civilization, a time of prosperity and artistic sophistication. The finding also indicates that this increase in warfare, possibly associated with climate change and resource scarcity, was not the cause of the disintegration of the lowland Maya civilization.

Image credit: Francisco Estrada-Belli/Tulane

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National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded researchers from North Carolina State and Elon universities have developed a technique that allows them to remotely control the movement of soft robots, lock them into position for as long as needed and later reconfigure the robots into new shapes. The technique relies on light and magnetic fields. "By engineering the properties of the material, we can control the soft robot's movement remotely; we can get it to hold a given shape; we can then return the robot to its original shape or further modify its movement; and we can do this repeatedly. All of those things are valuable, in terms of this technology's utility in biomedical or aerospace applications," says Joe Tracy, a professor of materials science and engineering at NC State and corresponding author of a paper on the work. In experimental testing, the researchers demonstrated that the soft robots could be used to form "grabbers" for lifting and transporting objects. The soft robots could also be used as cantilevers or folded into "flowers" with petals that bend in different directions. "We are not limited to binary configurations, such as a grabber being either open or closed," says Jessica Liu, first author of the paper and a Ph.D. student at NC State. "We can control the light to ensure that a robot will hold its shape at any point."

Image credit: Jessica A.C. Liu

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How do galaxies such as our Milky Way come into existence? How do they grow and change over time? The science behind galaxy formation has long been a puzzle, but a University of Arizona-led team of scientists is one step closer to finding answers, thanks to supercomputer simulations. Observing real galaxies in space can only provide snapshots in time, so researchers who study how galaxies evolve over billions of years need to use computer simulations. Traditionally, astronomers have used simulations to invent theories of galaxy formation and test them, but they have had to proceed one galaxy at a time. Peter Behroozi of the university's Steward Observatory and colleagues overcame this hurdle by generating millions of different universes on a supercomputer, each according to different physical theories for how galaxies form. The findings challenge fundamental ideas about the role dark matter plays in galaxy formation, the evolution of galaxies over time and the birth of stars. The study is the first to create self-consistent universes that are exact replicas of the real ones -- computer simulations that each represent a sizeable chunk of the actual cosmos, containing 12 million galaxies and spanning the time from 400 million years after the Big Bang to the present day. The results from the "UniverseMachine," as the authors call their approach, have helped resolve the long-standing paradox of why galaxies cease to form new stars even when they retain plenty of hydrogen gas, the raw material from which stars are forged. The research is partially funded by NSF's Division of Physics through grants to UC Santa Barbara's Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics and the Aspen Center for Physics.

Image credit: NASA/ESA/J. Lotz and the HFF Team/STScI

Source: Streetwise Reports   05/05/2020

For the last several summer drill seasons, most of Aben Resources Ltd.'s (ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB) attention has centered on its 23,000-hectare Forrest Kerr Gold Project, located in northern British Columbia, in the heart of the Golden Triangle.

Some of Canada's greatest mines, such as Premier, Snip and Eskay Creek, have been found on the Golden Triangle, located just inland from the Alaska Panhandle. Other significant and well-known deposits located within the Triangle include Brucejack, Galore Creek, Copper Canyon, Schaft Creek, KSM, Granduc and Red Chris.

In recent years, the Golden Triangle area has attracted lots of new exploration as infrastructure improvements, such as roads and power lines, have made access easier.

Aben's drills at Forrest Kerr at the end of the 2017 season discovered the North Boundary Zone, where values as high as 21.5 g/t gold, 28.5 g/t silver and 3.1% copper over 6 meters were unearthed. The following year drilling uncovered multiple high-grade gold zones at shallow depths in the zone, including an interval of 62.4 g/t Au over 6.0m starting at 114 meters downhole, establishing the continuity of the North Boundary Zone. Drilling also found the South Boundary Zone, located 1.5 kilometers from the North Boundary Zone, where assays showed "broad horizons of low-grade gold mineralization punctuated by intermittent intercepts of moderate to high-grade gold-silver-copper-zinc values."

For the 2019 exploration season, in nearly 10,000 meters of drilling that wrapped up on October-November 2019, Aben focused on the area south of the North Boundary Zone. "We were trying to find, not just continuity, but a structural source to it. We were drilling and testing a lot of these anomalies that showed up in the mag survey that we did at the beginning of last year before the season started. That was giving us good targets to work with," Aben CEO Jim Pettit told Streetwise Reports.

"As we headed south, much like the South Boundary Zone that we drilled back in 2018, we came up with these good intersections of gold and silver, but there were also lead-zinc and broader intersections of lower grade. So we had obviously come out of that zone that was high grade into a different type of mineralization," Pettit explained.

Pettit is hopeful that Aben will be able to explore Forrest Kerr this year. "Mining is deemed an essential activity in British Columbia, but, because of the coronavirus, we are concerned about the safety of our workers. We will be discussing this with the Tahltan Central Government to develop the proper protocols and make sure that the safeguards are in place for safely operating a camp."

The company has spent the winter analyzing its data in preparation for exploration this year. "We've gone through and detailed meter by meter all the drilling we've done. We've got some pretty good looking concepts to work with where we could be looking for possibly the feeder zone for the high-grade system and continuity," Pettit stated.

"Because of what we did last year on the west side of the Creek Fault, we've encountered another fault system that seems to be controlling a lot of the lower-grade mineralization as we headed south.," Pettit said. "If we follow that back up north toward the high-grade North Boundary Zone, there is a very large blind anomaly there that was not tested because it was covered in scree. This could give us some tremendous targets to work with.” "

In November, Aben reported that its drilling satisfied the expenditure requirements set out in the 2016 option agreement on the Forrest claim block, resulting in the company's 100% ownership of the Forrest Kerr property.

In addition to exploring Forrest Kerr, "Aben is always on the lookout for new projects to extend its exploration potential throughout the year," Pettit said.

Disclosure:
1) Patrice Fusillo compiled this article for Streetwise Reports LLC and provides services to Streetwise Reports as an employee. She or members of her household own securities of the following companies mentioned in the article: None. She or members of her household are paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: None.
2) The following company mentioned in this article is a billboard sponsor of Streetwise Reports: Aben Resources. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees.
3) Comments and opinions expressed are those of the specific experts and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security.
4) The article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports.
5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article until three business days after the publication of the interview or article. The foregoing prohibition does not apply to articles that in substance only restate previously published company releases. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of Aben Resources, a company mentioned in this article.

( Companies Mentioned: ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB, )

Source: Knox Henderson for Streetwise Reports   05/05/2020

News Update: A quick update since FansUnite Entertainment Inc. went live on Tuesday, May 5, because big things are happening in the industry, thus showing there is an enormous appetite for this kind of technology especially now, as we (very slowly) emerge out of this COVID pandemic. . .FansUnite is at a small-cap entry point with tremendous upside. After a financing at $0.35, the now-trading company rests slightly above that as a relatively new and unknown entity—so far—which is why now is great opportunity participate in a smaller scale, yet leveraged, consolidation play. "We have a great opportunity to use our stock as currency, and then grow and scale companies through our team and resources," says CEO Darius Eghdami. Read the entire update here.

Lets face it: gamers love games. While currently there's a dearth of real sports activity, that doesn't mean people aren't starving something to speculate on. No sports? No problem. Consider that there is $50 billion dollars placed online every year, according to ESPN. That's a lot of hungry money looking for a place to play.

So, despite the absence of the NFL, NHL, NBA and MLB, new online platforms are offering fun times for taking your chances on everything from reality TV shows, award shows, online gaming and virtual sports along with real in-the-flesh nail-biters like horse racing, table tennis and snooker. Who cares? It's all about the thrill of playing and winning. According to The The Guardian, just last week, "as coronavirus and the subsequent shelter-in-place orders have shut businesses around the globe and forced people to stay inside, some jobs have proven more stable than others," it said referring to online players. "The four U.S. states with legal sites—New Jersey, Nevada, Delaware, and Pennsylvania—reported record revenues in March." Meanwhile despite our current "modified behaviors" and "slowing of the economy," investors are also very keen on speculation in the gaming industry itself.

"FansUnite is at a small-cap entry point with tremendous upside."

Take, for example, DraftKings (NASDAQ:DKNG), which launched as recently as April 23, in the thick of this stay-at-home pandemic. After completing a merger with Diamond Eagle, a special purpose acquisition company, and back-end technology provider SBTech, its stock soared. Not only did DraftKings' stock jump 14% in its first day of trading before closing up 10.38% at $19.35, but the company was also able to add another half a billion dollars on the balance sheet at a time when it's not easy to raise money. The company is currently nearing a $1 billion market capitalization.

In this game, consolidation is key. Another highly successful big gaming conglomerate over-the-pond is UK-based GVC Gaming Group, which has been consolidating gaming assets over the last 15 years and is now worth $7.5 billion.

This week on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE) an emerging player is launching its platform onto the public market. FansUnite Entertainment Inc. (FANS:CSE), a company active in the gaming industry since 2014, is led by industry veterans who are looking to unleash their own high-growth consolidation strategy. The company is focusing on technology related to regulated and lawful internet activity and other related products.

Its business is to consolidate business-to-business (B2B) partnerships worldwide, operate its FansUnite business-to-consumer (B2C) coined Sportsbook launching later this year, and operate its recently acquired (March 26) Scottish subsidiary, McBookie, an online white-label sportsbook licensed and regulated by the U.K. Commission. Even considering the "COVID" delays in traditional sports, the company expects to generate at least $1 million in 2020. Considering FansUnite's experience in the space and its established technologies in an industry that is truly trending, FansUnite has a long runway from its current $25 million market cap to the billions-dollar peers it's chasing, and that is why this looks be a great stock to hold right out of the gate.

When you consider "B2B" in this scenario, consider an entity that wants to create a sportsbook, to become "the house," if you will. That company would turn to FansUnite to set up a turnkey "white-label" (as in use FansUnite technology but with its own brand) online platform, complete with user onboarding, fan integration and access to fulfillment in fiat currency (hard dollars) or cryptocurrency. For this service FansUnite takes a percentage of the "house earnings" and also charges for its Software as a Service (SaaS) platform. In the B2C scenario, FansUnite itself is the "house," using its own sportsbook and technology platform, and executes the marketing efforts to on-board new users.

McBookie, the company's first acquisition, is a white-label sportsbook in the UK, focusing on the Scottish market. It offers 200,000 members active in sports, and virtual games and boasts over $100 million turnover cumulatively the last three years. "It's a great brand with an experienced team operating for over a decade," says FansUnite CEO Darius Eghdami. "We completed this acquisition late March, and our focus currently is going to continue building our presence in the Scottish market."

Moving forward, Eghdami says the team will be putting an emphasis on M&A activity. "We'll continue to look for strong assets with either great technology or a strong database of users where we can come in with our team and resources and really grow and scale the business," he says.

With strong financial backing, Eghdami is also looking at potential opportunities in the colossal U.S. market. "The big heavyweights are coming into the U.S.. We don't intend to be an operator in the U.S., so we're looking at other ways to get in the market and that includes social peer activity, fan engagement, as well as licensed affiliate opportunities."

Eghdami points to another big success story in Canada, Amaya (TSE:TSGI), which is now The Stars Group and has a market capitalization of $11.5 billion. "It's a tremendous story of how they built the company and started to acquire assets. It's a model that we would love to follow."

After a crushing dip into the pandemic, TSGI.T is big-board player that has catapulted to new highs once the reality set in that social isolation might not necessarily be a bad thing for online gaming providers. According to Bloomberg, "The Stars Group Inc. says it saw record revenue in its first quarter as COVID-19 led to an increase in online activity starting in March. And, it says, it has continued to see increased activity in its online playing into the second quarter. In an update to its expectations for the three-month period ended March 31, the company says it expects revenue of approximately US$735 million, up from US$580 million in the first quarter of 2019."

"The stay-at-home lifestyle we now face in 2020 could result in a massive shift in the habits of players," says Eghdami. "Players that are used to going to the physical house, or the horse track, may now shift their habits to online. The older generation now may be signing up on online platforms and realize they can do this a lot easier. We're getting new users on the platform every day, and players starting to turn to virtual sports as well."

FansUnite is the brainchild of three entrepreneurs who have each already carved out more than a decade of in-the-trenches experience in the industry. Two of them including founder Eghdami and his former associate at KMPG, Graeme Moore, are chartered accountants, while co-founder Duncan McIntyre is a practicing lawyer schooled in mergers, acquisitions and corporate development. The teams' first success was the development of the FansUnite B2C social platform, which they eventually sold to a public company in 2016. FansUnite Social uses a free virtual currency for members to simulate the real thing while following and learning from their online heroes. The endgame, of course, is toward transferring the activity to the real-dollar platforms.

FansUnite Technology—B2C Social Platform

After the sale of the social peer platform, Eghdami and company decided to maintain the "FansUnite" brand equity in their new venture, launched in 2017. "We had the idea of getting into real-money sports gaming, spun it out of the pubic company, raised money in 2018 and started down this path. For the last year and a half we've been building our own technology to launch our sportsbook from a B2C perspective as well as prepare it for a full turn-key B2B solution. An option on the B2B platform will be a "smart contract sports book" whereby the funds are held "in-trust" and not accessible to FansUnite or end users until the event is completed and funds are directly sent to the winning party. The FansUnite platform is expected to accept cryptocurrency and regular fiat currency on its sportsbooks.

As part of FansUnite's roll-up strategy of entering into other world markets, acquiring yet maintaining well-established brands is the key to building its global B2B customers and B2C end users. The company is well funded with access to capital. Much of its support comes from industry leaders on the board like Shafin Diamond, CEO of Victory Square since 2015, a venture builder that builds start-ups in web, mobile, gaming, AI and AR/VR. Diamond has launched 40 start-ups in 24 countries, employed more than 350 people, and has generated over $100 million in annual revenues. He has received numerous awards, including the BC Tech Person of the Year Award, BC Angel Investor of the Year in 2014, and Business in Vancouver's Top 40 under 40.

FansUnite recently completed a financing of $3.1 million at $0.35 (free trading upon listing) and used $500,000 cash for the McBookie transaction before launching its IPO on the CSE. Total consideration for the McBookie deal was for approximately CAD$2.2 million, composed of the $500,000 cash up front, and $500,000 cash to be paid within 12 months, the rest in stock, at $0.35 a share, vesting and unrestricting over a course of 36 months.

Currently, management and insiders hold about 20% of the 70 million shares outstanding, and there are 3.5 million options and 1.4 million warrants with a weighted average price of $0.48 and $0.17 respectively, so no scary skeletons in the closet. Eghdami says the company is now sitting on about a $2 million war chest and burning about $175,000 per month. Should investor speculation lift its share price (as predicted here), it should be able to execute is M&A activity with a much stronger currency.

With $1 trillion waged annually, according to UK-based Football Report, the global market for this kind of technology is insane. Apparently, due to "COVID self-containment," it's "trending" even more as digital consumers are quarantined in their homes with nothing better to do but play on their computers.

As we hopefully ease out of this economic situation, FansUnite will have to execute fast and furiously. Now launching on the CSE at C$0.35 with a current market capitalization of $25 million, it has a long way to go, and much to prove, toward reaching the billion-dollar heights of its gaming peers, but the pie is big and the appetite is certainly there.

This is one race worth watching.

Knox Henderson is a journalist and capital markets communications consultant. He has advised for a broad range of small cap companies in the resource, life sciences and technology sectors for more than 25 years.

Disclosure:
1) 1) Knox Henderson: I, or members of my immediate household or family, own shares of the following companies mentioned in this article: None. I personally am, or members of my immediate household or family are, paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: FansUnite Entertainment Inc. My company has a financial relationship with the following companies mentioned in this article: None. I determined which companies would be included in this article based on my research and understanding of the sector.
2) The following companies mentioned in this article are billboard sponsors of Streetwise Reports: None. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees. As of the date of this article, an affiliate of Streetwise Reports has a consulting relationship with FansUnite. Please click here for more information. An affiliate of Streetwise Reports is conducting a digital media marketing campaign for this article on behalf of FansUnite. Please click here for more information. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security.
3) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of the author and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The author is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. The author was not paid by Streetwise Reports for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article. Streetwise Reports requires contributing authors to disclose any shareholdings in, or economic relationships with, companies that they write about. Streetwise Reports relies upon the authors to accurately provide this information and Streetwise Reports has no means of verifying its accuracy.
4) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports.
5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article until three business days after the publication of the interview or article. The foregoing prohibition does not apply to articles that in substance only restate previously published company releases. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of FansUnite, a company mentioned in this article.

( Companies Mentioned: FANS:CSE, )

Source: Streetwise Reports   05/07/2020

Oil and gas technology services and solutions company ION Geophysical Corp. (IO:NYSE) yesterday afternoon announced financial results for Q1/20 ending March 31, 2020.

The firm reported total net revenues of $56.4 million in Q1/20, which represented a 53% increase over $37.0 million in Q1/19. The company advised that the increase was due primarily to an increase in 2D multi-client data library sales.

For Q1/20, the firm additionally reported operating income of $6.3 million, compared to an operating loss of $15.9 million in Q1/19. The company further indicated that in Q1/20, it posted a net loss of $2.3 million, or ($0.16) per share, compared to a net loss of $21.4 million, or ($1.52) per share in Q1/19.

The company's President and CEO Chris Usher commented, "We achieved the best first quarter performance in six years despite challenges from both coronavirus and oil price volatility...Our strong revenues of $56 million generated positive operating income and $23 million in Adjusted EBITDA, and, as a result, we expect our liquidity position to improve as revenues are collected in the second quarter. Our first quarter results reflect the value of our offshore data library and validate the combined effectiveness of our strategic refocus and over $20 million cost reductions. Our team creatively closed a number of large multi-client contracts, some of which were delayed from the fourth quarter, even after E&P market dynamics changed. I remain confident in ION's value proposition to cost-effectively support customers' data-driven decision-making in this lower-for-longer exploration and production environment."

The company indicated that it has maintained a strong liquidity position in the face of energy market turmoil and the COVID-19 situation. The firm stated that as of March 31, 2020, it had total liquidity of $53.8 million, which consisted of $42.7 million in cash and $11.1 million remaining available balance under its $50.0 million revolving credit line.

ION Geophysical Corp. is a technology-focused company headquartered in Houston, Tex. that provides geophysical technology, services and solutions to the global oil and gas industry. Its products and technical services are designed to help oil and gas exploration and production companies obtain images of the earth's subsurface.

ION Geophysical started off the day with a market capitalization of around $25.1 million and an enterprise value of $115.7 million with approximately 15.03 million shares outstanding and a short interest of about 6.40%. IO shares opened more than 100% higher today at $3.37 (+$1.70, +101.80%) over yesterday's $1.67 closing price. The stock has traded between $2.84 to $4.36 per share today and is currently trading at $2.88 (+$1.21, +72.46%).

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( Companies Mentioned: IO:NYSE, )

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